Discepto Methuselah
by Nyx-Zephyrus
Summary: L and Light argue about things, in that special special L and Light way. No slash, not much plot, just pure uncensored intellect. Chapter 4: The God of the new world.
1. Utopia

"Yagami-kun," L said suddenly, eyes glued to what appeared to be a thoroughly uninteresting article presumably related in some manner to the Investigation (in his mind, Light always capitalized "Investigation." Being as how it ruled his life, he figured he had the right). He had the tip of his thumb between his teeth, which meant he was thinking outside the box. "What are your thoughts on the morality of society?"

Light's eyebrows elevated a few degrees. L had done this before—attempted to pry Kira-like information out of him by use of his "opinion." It got bothersome after a while, but Light refused to back down from the challenge.

"That's sort of a loaded question, Ryuuzaki. Can you narrow it down at all?"

L paused for a moment, thumb becoming temporarily un-gnawed upon as he reached around his knees to extract a maraschino cherry from the porcelain bowl on his desk. He appeared to be formulating his thoughts into words.

"One might think," he began slowly, eyes never leaving the dull glow of his computer screen, "that morality is a matter of promoting the good of one's _society_, understood as an entity in its own right. The immediate problem is that we might reasonably doubt whether there really exists any such entity, or whether we can sensibly talk of it having a 'good', or welfare interests."

Light swiveled his desk chair to face him, sensing that this would end up requiring his full attention. The chain between them clattered noisily on the floor. "Okay," he said vaguely, unsure of the direction this would take. L didn't look at him.

"But even if we can ascribe a societal _telos_ – longevity and power, say – there's the more fundamental problem that the society might be objectively bad, and so not worth helping at all."

Oh, yes. This was definitely a go-between for Kira. Light almost had to crack a grin at the absurdity of it all. "I think most people feel that way. It accounts for the general public, aside from some select individuals, that never seem to care at all for the advancement of their society. But that's just laziness, justified by dissatisfaction."

L finally blinked as the mesmerizing hum of his computer released him, and he glanced at Light with the bare briefness of a smile—the sly sort of smile that always made Light suspicious. "In that case, attend an experiment with me," he replied. "Imagine a dystopia of ruthless efficiency, where individuals are brainwashed from birth and tightly controlled by faceless institutions. Members eat dull, nutritious food; work productively on uninspired projects that increase the power of society's institutions—though never, of course, its private citizens— and reproduce in sufficient numbers to further support this 'purpose'."

"Sounds a bit like the society we live in now," said Light offhandedly, resting his chin on one hand.

"Do you think so?" replied L, in a manner that clearly said 'so does Kira, how interesting,' and plucked another cherry from the bowl. "This experimental society is little more than a virus, propagating itself to no higher end; still, we may suppose that this miserable situation is perfectly sustainable. So there seem no formal grounds to deny that the continued exploitation of the people could in fact be good for the State—society, as it were."

"In the scenario you're describing, "miserable" would have to be relative in itself," Light said. "It's entirely possible that the inhabitants of this world view the good of the society to be interchangeable with the good of the individual. How can we assume that the people in such a society, who have never known anything else, would be miserable?"

"Let us assume that they are, being that they are indeed self-sufficient and thinking individuals," said L in his peculiar not-quite-condescending-but-almost manner. "Now suppose, by some fluke, one individual manages to overcome his brainwashing. Is he morally obligated to continue to serve this society?" Another cherry popped between his lips and the thumb returned to its usual position, slightly stained with cherry juice. "On the contrary, it seems far more plausible that you're obligated to destroy the miserable institutions and start a whole new society in its place -- one that will be better for its inhabitants."

Light frowned, suddenly unsure of where this psychological banter was coming from. L was speaking the way he'd always said Kira thought—was it intentional? By appearing to agree with Kira's mindset, was he trying to lure Light into admitting that he thought the same way? Or was he actually agreeing with Kira…?

"The closest thing that applies to would be the American Declaration of Independence," he said thoughtfully. "If you find yourself in a society with institutions that do not support fundamental human ends, like the pursuit of happiness, then you should work to alter or abolish the institutions, replacing them with institutions that are more conducive to those ends."

"Yes," said L absently.

"But in that case, it tells of a complete disregard for the authority of government. Here in Japan, and virtually everywhere, it's been the cultural norm for thousands of years to operate by the standards of the government simply under the _assumption _that it operates to improve their lives is to better society, and vice versa, in most situations. If too many people try to question that sort of hierarchal authority, it creates a lesser form of anarchy."

"You are forgetting that we are examining a hypothetical society, one that discourages individuality and interpersonal thought," replied the detective, almost laying his cheek on one knee as he turned his head to look at Light. "It operates without regard to the citizens in favor of the political machine as a whole."

"But the entire point of a society is that what is best for the machine is best for the individuals composing it."

L shook his head, pulling the stem from another cherry with his usual two-fingered delicateness. "My point is simply that this convenient coincidence is not _guaranteed_ to hold. And when they diverge, it is the welfare of the people, not the society, that matters." He swallowed this cherry whole, lacing his fingers over his knees and letting his eyes wander to the ceiling in thought. "I conclude, then, that people are not universally obliged to serve "their society", the institutional order they actually happen to find themselves in. At most, we are obligated to serve our collective, which is simply _us_ – a plurality of persons – and not some impersonal entity that exists over and above us."

"That's what society _is_, by nature," Light protested. "Humans, as social creatures, need that structure. It changes, over time, but the basic fundamentals remain the same—some people are in authority and, in some way, dictate the behavior of those who aren't."

"You might," said L, "be confusing what I mean by "society" with a vision of "state." A collective operative does not necessarily equal a government. That is why I asked you your thoughts on the morality of society, and not the effectiveness."

"In that case, what is good for society may very well be bad for the state."

"True."

"The welfare of society might be compared to the total good of utilitarianism; both are aggregate measures which have no direct reflection in the real world. You can't read off total happiness or the wellbeing of society just from a few individuals, or from whether people express dissatisfaction or not. As an off the cuff description consider the wellbeing of society a measure of that societies competitiveness as compared to other societies."

L simply watched him out of the corner of his sleepless eyes. Undaunted, and oddly invigorated by the rare intellectual stimulus, Light wandered on.

"Your hypothetical society would also, eventually, fail. Other societies would technologically outpace it due to the achievement that comes with individual originality. By these standards your political machine is bad because ruthless efficiency fails at producing innovation and it can't attract members from other societies. It also has a hard time holding onto its own members, since no brainwashing is perfect. Thus in the long run it isn't very competitive."

"Nonsense," said L, rolling his eyes. " As the author of the thought experiment, I get to stipulate that my miserable society can and does outcompete the others, even in the long run. This is logically possible: there's a possible world where this is true, and it serves as my counterexample."

Light grinned, but continued. "But outcompetition is not, considering the properties of society by nature, possible. Besides, an effective hypothesis involves comparison. To be convincing you need to specify how it is better than any other possible society, not just the engineered less-efficient ones placed around it to prove your hypothetical point."

"You are becoming tangential."

"That may be. But I think your hypothesis is wrong."

L shrugged, plucking another cherry from his bowl. "And you are certainly allowed to, Yagami-kun."

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**_Author's note: _**_Yeah… everybody's on and on about how these two are geniuses, IQs off the chart and whatnot… I'm like, "let 'em prove it." :)_

_This will almost certainly be continued, because philosophical debates plus Death Note equals a lot of fun for Nyx. This's probably what I'll do when _Kingdom Come_ is giving me grief. Like now._

_Feedback welcome, even stuff like "... wtf?" :D_


	2. Around and around

"Kindly cease arguing with me, Yagami-kun," L ground out petulantly, flat on his back and glaring bullets at the ceiling. They'd fallen into a peculiar little routine, and the ceaseless banter appeared to be wearing on his nerves. He'd even elected to sleep tonight, laying on top of the covers in their shared bed. Light, on the other hand, was enjoying every minute of it.

"I'm not arguing, L," he said sweetly, intentionally avoiding use of the pseudonym, "I'm debating. If I'm here because you value my intellect, then I should be able to tell you when I think you're wrong."

"I think," replied L vaguely, "that you simply enjoy defying everything that I say for the sake of it."

"That's not true at all. I find your opinions fascinating, I just don't think they're right. We argue in order to persuade those holding differing opinions to conform to our own."

"Or to annoy them…"

Light put on his best innocent face, propping an elbow up on his pillow. Their room wasn't particularly dark, and he could see L's sallow eyes clearly. "I thought you liked debating with me. It's not like we can really talk to anyone else."

That might have been true… as much as he tried not to think about it, the only human being L could talk to without having to carefully select his words was Yagami Light. They were simply on another level than the people around them. "Debate over intelligent questions I enjoy, Yagami-kun. But simply arguing for the sake of it is counterproductive and time-consuming."

Light shrugged. "One could argue that debate itself is counterproductive. By sorting out your beliefs and putting them into words, you'll only become more solid in them and thereby less likely to understand the other person's point of view. But it's entertaining."

L finally shot him a look. "That is only true for inherently closed-minded and stubborn individuals. If you go into a debate only with the intention of proving the others false, you are only going to frustrate yourself."

"But the point of the debate is to, if not prove your opponent wrong, then to prove yourself correct to a higher degree."

L snorted. "I cannot find it surprising in the least that you feel that way. Consciously debating a topic provides one with an understanding of views and beliefs other than his own. It stimulates the mind and increases knowledge over a given subject and readies participants for any similar debates or arguments in the future." He rattled it off like a textbook entry, and Light found himself thinking that, if arguing could open the mind and be so relaxing as all that, then L certainly hadn't done enough of it in his lifetime.

"I don't think people generally work that way. When a person debates, disagrees or points out the illogic in another person's statements, it only forces that other person to further defend and become entrenched in their original argument. It only serves to drive the two perspectives further apart."

"Good debaters know when they've lost and learn from their mistakes." L raised an eyebrow in his direction, sensing that that one wouldn't go over well. Yagami Light did not admit defeat.

Light, predictably, proved his point. "All people are set in their ways. Even if they do admit that the other person was right, simply coming to that conclusion in an argument isn't enough to change the opinion that they started out with. That just adds deception to the table, and both parties walk away uncomfortable."

"I think most great debaters would agree that the goal of debate is not to win, Yagami-kun," L said, fighting for control over a yawn. "In the end, the conclusion of the debate barely matters at all. The debate itself encourages open-mindedness and improves the relationship between both members by hearing, if not understanding, the other person's point of view."

"If the conclusion doesn't matter, then the debate becomes even more pointless and counterproductive."

"You're right, in a sense. The act of arguing something out rarely changes anything."

Light took the moment to stare as L's eyes closed against his pale skin. "Then what is your point?"

"I do not have a point, Yagami-kun. You are the one who started this exchange."

Light continued to stare wide-eyed as L's breath evened out slowly. Eventually he rolled over and pulled the blanket up beneath his chin, somehow feeling as if he'd been incredibly duped.

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_The word debate itself derives from the Latin word "Debatum" which means to reach an agreement. Which, I'm inclined to think, these two will probably never do. :)_

_Also, I suppose it's worth noting that most of this is taking place during the memory-less chain arc-- because the chain was cool, and Light's so much more fun to screw with when he's all big-eyed and only as evil as any other teenaged kid._


	3. Nondeceptive Lies

"Yeah, thanks, Misa," Light said dryly into the phone, fiddling idly with a strand of his hair as he waited for her to shut up. "Mmhm. Love you too. Bye." He exhaled generously as he folded the cell and slid it into his jeans pocket. God, but that woman could talk. 

Across the table over his pancakes (pancakes for dinner... the very thought of it made him queasy), L was looking at him thoughtfully. Of course, a thoughtful look from L translated as more of a wide-eyed death stare to anyone else, and while Light was fairly used to the detective's eccentricities, it got a little disconcerting after a while. "What?"

"You do not respect Amane-san much." He stated it as if helpfully reminding him that the sky was blue and water was liquid.

Light simply looked at him, spearing himself a chopsticks-ful of ramen. The two of them rarely took a break from work in order to eat, but there was a glitch in one of L's computers, so they occupied themselves while Watari figured it out. Instead of "duh" which was his first response, he came back with "What makes you say that?"

"You lie to her frequently."

Raising an eyebrow, Light blew the steam from his noodles. "For all you know, I lie to you frequently."

"That would be unwise," L understated blandly.

"Yeah, I know." He shrugged. "I don't lie to Misa. I just find it easier to tell her what she wants to hear."

"Yesterday, you told her that you could not visit her at her home because you were ill." L clinically seperated one sliver of pancake from the pile and placed it delicately on his tongue, staring intently at his suspect the whole time. "You were not ill, Yagami-kun."

Light glared at him, the faintest of flushes beginning to ghost over his cheeks. "I didn't say that to hurt her feelings. I just thought she'd get tired of hearing the same excuse every day."

"You are working very dilligently on this case," L pointed out. "That is true, and thereby not an excuse. There was no necessity of deception."

Light rolled his eyes. Like L gave a crap about lying to Misa, he was just giving him a hard time. "Deception is different from lying for social niceties. They're called "white lies." They don't hurt anything."

"But what is the point, I wonder?" L quirked an eyebrow at him, smirking that not-there-but-visible L-smirk. "Amane-san is involved in a relationship with you. Most would agree that this gives her a right to the information she is requesting."

"Working here makes a certain amount of conversational aversion necessary, Ryuuzaki. It's not like I can tell her what I'm doing all day. And frankly even if I could, it's really none of her business in the first place. It's like someone you don't know all that well asking you what's been going on in your life-- people are automatically going to give them bare highlights, not the details."

"The point of polite formulae and broad abstentions from expression is to leave a great range of potentially disruptive material unacknowledged and therefore out of play... this is not a form of deception because it is meant to be understood by everyone," L agreed musingly, the sudden shift into textbook-mode causing Light's head to breifly spin before upping the level of dialouge just to remain on the same page.

"I think it is wrong to intentionally deceive others, to take as your goal the manipulation of their beliefs so as to introduce falsehood," he replied smoothly, in no way prepared to be intellectually one-upped by L. "But we have social norms such as "lying" to protect privacy that are recognized as standard practice, so nobody is actually deceived."

"So if you say something false in order to protect your privacy, which has as an undesired albeit predictable side-effect that it gives rise to false beliefs in the listener, then that is morally acceptible?"

Light eyed L suspiciously as the detective innocently ate his pancakes, sensing that L had something up his sleeve for this one.

"If one did not intend to be deceptive; the listener's beliefs are mere "collateral damage"," the detective continued blandly, adding a fresh waterfall of syrup to his dinner. "When there are secrets to be kept, the interest of privacy must be concerned... is this right?

"Not necessarially secrets," Light defended. "If you need to lie to protect your privacy then that is a sign that there are issues regarding how others will deal with the truth." He kept L's gaze, and noted with a sinking sensation that the faint glimmer in the ebony orbs was telling him that he was on the wrong side of this fight."I'm not defending deception in general, only those untruths that serve a deflective purpose."

"I see," L cooed mildly. "If your privacy has already been violated, you might wish to manipulate others' beliefs back towards the state they were in before the violation."

And Light heard the underlying translation becoming a stronger and stronger _"Kira Kira Kiraaaa." _He wasn't sure whether to force his hand or to simply roll his eyes and let L have his delusions. So he decided on an altogether more tantalizing method, coolly (insofar as it was possible) slurping his noodles with a shrug. "A bit like how it might be okay to kill someone as long as they intended to kill you."

He practically heard the gears in L's head grind to a halt, and the pleasure in that almost overrode the fact that he had most assuredly just screwed himself over most fully and for the rest of his living days.

L's wide-eyed stare darkened considerably, and he opened his mouth to reply at precisely the moment that the mechanized door to the kitchen slid open with an electric _whoosh. _Watari's head appeared through the slot. "Ryuuzaki, I have remedied the issue."

"Thank you, Watari." Nod. _Whoosh. _

There was a long moment of silence, and Light's heart began to pound double-time.

"Well then," said L, uncurling himself from his chair and leaving his syrup-coated plate where it was, presumably for someone else to get disgusted with and clean... "shall we go?"

"Go...?"

L's head tilted in the direction of their shared bedroom. "I will retrieve the key and unchain us. My suspicion of you is fully lifted."

Light blinked at him for several seconds. "... really?"

"No," said L, tugging him mildly from his seat and opening the door to the investigations room. "I lied."


	4. Atheism

_"L, do you know…?"_

Light glanced up at the murmured phrase, raising an eyebrow at the older detective seeming to address himself. It was early evening, and there had been silence in the room for over an hour before this half-whispered phrase, punctuated only by the chaotic clattering of fingers on keys and the occasional sigh of frustration from Matsuda.

L was staring at his own screen fixedly but wasn't seeing it. Light recognized the distant glaze to L's unblinking eyes, the thumb determinedly pressed to his lips—L was elsewhere, his thoughts revolving through some cyclonic hyperbole or another. He was the victim of a chronic disconnectedness; even while engaged in conversation his mind was digging within itself, remembering, deducing, applying and analyzing. It was visible to everyone, disturbing and frightening them on a deeply fundamental level that could only manifest itself in a vague discomfort, his audience unnerved without being quite sure of the source.

_"Gods of death…"_

Light, on the other hand, unlike the few other people around whom L spent time, had come beyond being unsettled and past being fascinated, and had settled somewhere on a comfortable area of being resignedly annoyed.

"What in the hell are you mumbling about?"

Siphoned back to the present, L's eyes slid sharply to the left. Nothing else moved, thumb still magnetized to his pursed lips, and the sudden eye movement made him look wholly silly enough to make Light raise the other eyebrow at him in condescending reproach.

But L was not to be bullied so, and in response tilted his head bizarrely toward his shoulder, eyes owlishly unblinking as he asked the question;

"Do you believe in God, Yagami?"

Light kept up the deadpan stare for several seconds, juggling whether he felt like humoring L's out-of-nowhere theological conundrums just now.

"No."

"Why not?"

And just like that, Light felt the rest of his evening spiraling rapidly downward. L had some psychological voodoo atom bomb aimed at his head. "Why… not? Is anyone really expected to answer that?"

"I can't imagine any respected theologist is willing to make such a statement without logistics to back it up," L said, still frozen in his acrobatic head-tilt. "You answered easily, so I wonder as to your reasons behind your opinion. That's all."

"That's never _all_."

L only looked at him, unprovoked. Behind them, Aizawa and Matsuda exchanged perplexed glances and pointedly kept their mouths shut.

Light laced his fingers and propped both of his thumbs at the bridge of his nose. "I don't have time to believe in God," he said dryly, "because I'm a practicing Neo-Cthulhu worshipper and I eat babies. They're wonderful for the digestion."

"And also a potent aphrodisiac and very nice prepared with garlic oil. That is not what I meant, Light-kun."

A peculiar choking sound from across the room _almost_ made Light crack a smile. It would take the remainder of the task force a while to learn that L did have a sense of humor, albeit on the border of degenerate. It was another little trait that he shared with Light.

The detective's neck made a small popping noise as he realigned himself to look human, swiveling his chair around with his toes and gifting Light with a small smile. "It is of importance to the Investigation," he said, and Light could hear the capitalization as a double entendre. "It would be most helpful if Light-kun would share his theological perspective with me."

Inwardly, Light shook his head and laughed. This… would probably never end.

Outwardly, he leveled a confident stare at his verbal antagonist with an acquiescing smile. "Fine, Ryuuzaki. I don't believe in God because I have yet to observe evidence of deity in the world, and I don't feel insecure enough in my own existence to need an obscure faith to ground me. Do _you_ believe in God?"

L good-naturedly took the sarcasm. "I only ask," he said by way of reply and ignoring the question, "in regard to this statement made by Kira. _L, do you know Gods of Death love apples?_ I wonder if Kira intended this to be taken literally."

"Ryuuzaki," said Light with just the right amount of coy, acting surprised, "I thought there was more to that phrase. Something about red hands?"

"If he did, it brings Kira's spiritual beliefs into question. Was he implying even then that Shinigami exist?" Light once again laughed on the inside as L glossed over the question regarding his earlier lie. Point: Yagami. "It could be that our suspect suffers from the delusion that some sort of death deity is guiding his actions."

Light laid his cheek on one fist, not bothering to conceal the lazy smirk. "I think it's a little far-fetched to think that Kira is mentally ill at this point. We both know that the statement about Death Gods and apples was only a taunt to bait you. And it evidently worked."

L looked at him sharply, but didn't bite. "Our suspect is most certainly mentally ill, Light-kun. It's not unreasonable to think at this point that Kira believes _himself_ a god, which only makes the possibility of his personal theological beliefs all the more prevalent. If, for example, Kira does believe in the existence of a multitheistic spectrum of many gods, how does he intend to become one of them?"

"But there's always the other option that Kira believes in one universal God." Light suspected L would come back round to that, and took a faint pleasure in beating him to it.

"Almost certainly," replied L, verifying his suspicions, "in which case the only way that Kira could perceive to craft himself as an omnipotent entity would be to surpass the original "God."

"Interesting," Light said vaguely. "But I do find it more likely that, if Kira has any theistic faith at all, which is unlikely, he would lean more in the direction of many gods."

"Why do you think so?"

Their other teammates had forgotten to pretend that they weren't listening. Aizawa had a fierce look of determined attention as he visibly tried to catch the undertones, and Matsuda just looked relieved to have even the first idea of what they were talking about.

"Simple," said Light in reply. "Kira's powers, whatever they are, are far from multiversal. He can only kill— to create situations in which death works to his advantage. If Kira does want to become a god, he could only be a Shinigami."

L fixed him with a thoughtful stare, eyes wide and unblinking as he processed this perspective. "Yes," he said at length, "that is probably right."

Graciously, Light gave a simple little shrug and laid his fingertips back to his keys. They were both silent for a while. Several minutes ticked by, while behind them Matsuda and Aizawa turned their attention back to their work and began to compare notes, talking in muted tones and scribbling statistics on the backs of papers. L did more or less nothing, but twisted himself back around and replaced his thumb on the thin line of his mouth.

Light found himself speaking again. "Of course, if Kira is as intelligent as we're assuming he is… surely he must know that even if gods and demons exist, Shinigami could never be real."

"Why is that?" L didn't move, but the interest leaked into his voice. Light looked at him blankly.

"To imagine a god as a representative of a particular thing… death, in this case… there would have to be a reverse god of life, and so on. It makes sense in an archaic way. But logically, it's along the same lines of there being a god of heat and a god of cold."

"And is that so hypothetically impossible? If there is a god of one thing, why is there not a god for every other thing as well?"

"Heat," said Light, "is a reaction of chemical compounds. It is a process that is visible, can be measured, and has an effect on everything around it. There's no measurement for cold because cold is nothing more than heat to a lesser degree. They are the same function, not opposites. Death is the same way—not the opposite of life, but the absence of it. Death doesn't exist. It can't exist, being by nature a thing of nonexistence. So theologically, to have a celestial representation of the lack of existence doesn't make sense. There's no balance."

L blinked slowly, considering this. "Light-kun is very well deified for an atheist."

"Never said I was an atheist, Ryuuzaki," Light replied, shooting him Kira's grin. "You could say that my religion just hasn't caught on yet."

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_Yeah, this is weird. But I had to crank something out. That last bit reminded me of the boat scene from_ Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, _which is one of my favorite movies that I highly recommend to everybody. :)_


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